Supporters
of Israel were delighted to learn that President George W. Bush’s
recent call in his much-heralded inaugural address for worldwide
democratic revolution was based on the philosophy of Soviet-born
Israeli cabinet minister Anatoly “Natan” Sharansky.

While a recent popular documentary, Bush’s Brain, suggested
that Karl Rove, the president’s political advisor, was the
mastermind who tells the president what to think, it is now clear
that Sharansky is the one who actually has bragging rights to that
title.

Although he gained worldwide attention in the 1970s as a Soviet
dissident, make no mistake in thinking that Sharansky was ever any
kind of Western-style free-market conservative or anti-communist.
Instead, Sharansky was a traditional old-line communist who —
like many others in the Soviet Union — simply ran afoul of
the ruling regime. But thanks to an adoring international media,
Sharansky capitalized on his imprisonment by the Soviets —
accused of being a spy for the CIA — and emerged as a much-touted
“human rights activist.”

Later, after his release from prison, Sharansky emigrated to Israel
and soon established himself as one of the country’s most
outspoken extremist leaders who condemns even Israel’s heavy-handed
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as being “too soft” on Palestinians.

The role of Sharansky in guiding Bush’s thinking is no “conspiracy
theory.” Instead, recent disclosures from the White House
— published, although not prominently, in the mainstream media
— demonstrate that not only did Sharansky personally consult
with the president in drafting the controversial inaugural address,
but — in addition — at least two of Sharansky’s
key neo-conservative American publicists, William Kristol and Charles
Krauthammer, were among those brought in to compose Bush’s
revolutionary proclamation.

HOW BUSH THINKS

Bush told The Washington Times in an interview
published on Jan. 12 — prior to his inauguration: “If
you want a glimpse of how I think about foreign policy, read Natan
Sharansky’s book, The Case for Democracy.
It’s a great book.”

Buried in the very last paragraph of a very lengthy article published
on Jan. 22, The New York Times reported
that “The president was given [Sharansky’s] book and
asked Mr. Sharansky to meet with him in the Oval Office. . . . Mr.
Bush also gave the book to several aides, urging them to read it
as well. Mr. Sharansky visited the White House last November.”

The Times did not disclose who gave the
book to the president.

Affirming the Times’s disclosure,
The Washington Post revealed on Jan.
22 — although, again, in the closing paragraphs of an extended
analysis — that an administration official said that planning
for Bush’s address began immediately after the November election
and that Bush himself had invited Sharansky to the White House to
consult with him. In the Post’s
words, “Sharansky also helped shape the speech with his book.”

It was the Post which revealed that two well-known “neoconservative”
supporters of Israel — William Kristol, publisher of billionaire
Rupert Murdoch’s Weekly Standard
magazine, and psychiatrist-turned-pundit Charles Krauthammer, a
strident advocate for harsh U.S. military and economic warfare against
the Arab and Muslim worlds — were also among those brought
in to help draft the president’s address.

Kristol and Krauthammer are generally acknowledged in the mainstream
media in America as being among those dubbed by AFP as “the
high priests of war.” The two were instrumental in promoting
the U.S. war against Iraq, which was a measure high up on Israel’s
“want list” for the Bush administration.

The individual on the White House staff whom the Post
says helped set up the planning conferences to direct Bush’s
thinking was Peter Wehner, who is director of the White House Office
of Strategic Initiatives.

Wehner is a Kristol protégé, having been his deputy
when Kristol was chief of staff for former Reagan administration
Education Secretary William Bennett. Bennett had been a protégé
of Kristol’s father, famed “ex-Trotskyite” communist-
turned- neo-conservative, Irving Kristol.

Considering Kristol’s wide-ranging input, shaping Bush’s
mindset, it is no surprise that, as the Post
put it, “Bush’s grand ambitions excited his neo-conservative
supporters who see his call to put the United States in the forefront
of the battle to spread democracy as noble and necessary.”

On Jan. 24, Kristol chimed in with an editorial in The
Weekly Standard declaring that “it’s good
news that the president is so enthusiastic about Sharansky’s
work. It suggests that, despite all the criticism, and the difficulties,
the president remains determined to continue to lead the nation
along the basic foreign policy lines he laid down in his first term.”

BBC News noted on Jan. 22 that Sharansky “has in fact been
moving in American conservative circles for some time.”

As far back as July 2002 — just prior to the time Bush delivered
a hotly debated speech calling for “democratization”
of the Arab world — neo-conservative Deputy Defense Secretary
Paul Wolfowitz was in attendance at a conference addressed by Sharansky
during which the Israeli leader put forth the same demand.

Shortly thereafter, when Bush gave his own speech, echoing Sharansky,
the Israeli hard-liner “provided an important bit of last-minute
affirmation,” according to American neo-conservative Richard
Perle, who — between stints in government, during which time
he was suspected of espionage on behalf of Israel — peddled
weapons for an Israeli arms manufacturer.

BIG NEWS IN ISRAEL

Although the news of Sharansky’s profound influence is not
widely known among grassroots Americans outside Washington, it is
big news in Israel, where The Jerusalem Post
headlined a story declaring: “White House takes a page out
of Sharansky’s democracy playbook.” The Israeli newspaper
went so far as to say on Jan. 20 that Bush is “doing [Sharansky’s
book] promotion free of charge,” pointing out that the president
hyped Sharansky’s book in an interview on CNN.

But it’s not only Bush who is relying on Sharansky. On Jan.
20, Scotland’s independent-minded newspaper, The
Scotsman, noted that “Mr. Sharansky’s
influence on the way Washington now sees the world was clear this
week when Condoleezza Rice quoted him during her Senate confirmation
hearings,” confirming that the Israeli hard-liner is very
much the brains behind Bush policy.

The fact that Sharansky happens to be in charge of “Diaspora
affairs” in the Israeli cabinet is significant. The term “Diaspora”
refers to all Jews living outside the borders of Israel. The “mission
statement” of Sharansky’s cabinet office says it places
its “emphasis on Israel, Zionism, Jerusalem and the interdependence
of Jews worldwide. In essence, this translates into a single, general
aim: securing the existence and the future of the Jewish people
wherever they are.” Sharansky is no less than a powerful spokesman
for the worldwide Zionist movement. And now, beyond any question,
his views are directing Bush’s worldview.

Considering all of this, it is no wonder that on Jan. 22, South
Korea’s English-language media voice, Chosun Ilbo,
went so far as to describe Sharansky’s views as “a blueprint
for U.S. foreign policy.”

Sidebar commentary:

Natan Sharansky
Pegged as ‘Hypocrite’

Human rights for some —but not for all

Although the worldwide media hails President Bush’s
philosophical mentor, Israeli politician Natan Sharansky,
as a “human rights activist,” there is much
more to Sharansky’s point of view than the media is
saying.

Writing on Jan. 9 in The Washington Post Book
World — in response to a review of Sharansky’s
book, The Case for Democracy,
published on Dec. 26 — M. J. Rosenberg of Chevy Chase,
Md., laid out Sharansky’s hypocrisy in no uncertain
terms:

Sharansky advocates for human rights
only when his own country, Israel, is not involved. Throughout
his post-Soviet-prison career, he has used his celebrity
status to support human rights for everyone — except
Palestinians. [Sharansky believes] that before Palestinians
are permitted a state and perhaps (just perhaps —
he is a strong supporter of Israel’s settler movement)
an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip, they must fulfill a host of conditions. For
Palestinians, basic rights are conditional; for everyone
else, they are fundamental.

The test of whether one is a human rights
activist or one who simply uses the issue for political
ends is that person’s willingness to apply the human
rights measuring stick to his own people. It is pretty easy
to limit your calls for human rights to nations other than
your own.

For Sharansky, concern for Palestinians is the test of whether
or not his claim to the mantle of human rights activist
is genuine. As [Sharansky’s] book demonstrates, he
fails — big time.